Where's My Little Girl?
by liz R
Summary: Harry and Hermione spend the night...
1. Default Chapter

"Where's My Little Girl?" By: Liz R.  
  
It was 12:58 in the morning. Who the hell would be calling at 12:58 AM? Stanley M. Granger DDS slipped out from between the white silky sheets of the queen sized bed he shared with his wife.  
  
"Hello," he yawned into the phone, still wondering who the caller might be. Perhaps it was Mrs. Jenkins. Well if it was, he was sorry about Timmy's overbite for the last sodding time!  
  
"Um, Mr. Granger." a nervous voice said. Why it was Harry. What did his evil wizard of a son-in-law want at 12:58 AM?  
  
"Harry, it's nearly one in the morning! If you DON'T mind, please call back TOMARROW."  
  
"Stan, who are you yelling at?" Mrs. Granger asked. "If that's Mrs. Jenkins again, I'm calling the police."  
  
"It's that idiot son-in-law of ours," Mr. Granger growled. He hated his son- in-law with a fiery passion for stealing his baby girl away from him. That day when Hermione had come home bearing news of engagement.how could she have been engaged? She was fourteen, wasn't she? But his wife had assured him that Hermione was turning eighteen in September. (The point is, Mr. Granger was never home, and didn't know his ass from a hole in the ground about his daughter.but don't tell him I said that.) Why he hated Harry almost as much as he hated seeing 'Jenkins, Timothy G.' on his list of patients for the day! And THAT, ladies and gentlemen of the jury, was SAYING something.  
  
Mrs. Granger took the phone. "Harry, what's wrong?" As he answered, Mrs. Granger's face went rigid. "We'll be right there." She hung up the phone. "STAN! GET DRESSED!" she wailed. Her husband obliged.  
  
"What's going on?" Mr. Granger asked his wife irritably as she drove the car to.wherever it was they were going. "Where are we rushing off to?"  
  
"The hospital of course! Hermione is having the baby, Stan!"  
  
Oh, and that was another thing.the jerk had gotten her pregnant, and damn fast too. A week after they got married, that's how fast! He'd always remember that fateful night.  
  
***("Ladies and gentlemen, I'm about to travel through time, I bid you adieu. ")***  
  
3 October was both Mr. Granger's father's and Mrs. Granger's mother's birthday. They were having a double birthday party for them with all the relatives from both sides.  
  
Hermione came rushing in late. Still being considered a child, it would take more than this to catch anyone's full attention. She sat next to her hot new husband and whispered excitedly in his ear. He kept stuttering things back.  
  
The adults noticed this, and wondered for a few seconds what was happening. Then they resumed talking.  
  
Suddenly, a few seconds later, Hermione's voice exploded in the direction of Harry, "That's right; you're going to be a daddy!" The room went deadly quiet. Hermione and Harry didn't seem to notice, as they were rolling all over each other, kissing and giggling.  
  
Thus, it had TRULY begun. ***Back to the present***  
  
When they reached the hospital, a wizard's hospital (Stan wanted to gag), they were pointed in the direction of the St. Mungo's Women and Babies Center.  
  
They asked for directions to room 127. When they arrived outside the door, Mrs. Granger turned to her husband. "Brace yourself, Gramps, you about to become a grandpa at forty-six."  
  
. 


	2. Simon James

Chapter 2  
  
When the door of the hospital room clicked open, it became evident that the Grangers had missed all the action. The delivering mediwizard was wrapping the tiny newborn in a periwinkle blue delivering blanket. Hermione was lying back on the cot, flushed and out of breath. Harry was stroking her forehead in a comforting way and smiling at her. The bum.  
  
"Oh!" Mrs. Granger cried. "Oh, Hermione, I'm so happy for you!" Harry smiled wider at Hermione as he relocated his strokes to her trembling hand.  
  
"Well," Mr. Granger barked, fighting back to harsh tears of revelation that threatened to overpower him. "Is it a boy or a girl?"  
  
Hermione turned to look at her father. Her pale, sweaty face sent a chill to his spine. When had she grown up this much? No longer was she the little eight-year-old who sat in the waiting room of 'Granger and Granger Family Dentistry' hour after hour on Saturdays, reading because she had nothing better to do. She was a woman, a MOTHER. "It's a boy."  
  
The nurse was coming back with Hermione's son. Well, if he HAD to have a grandson at forty-six, he had might as well make the best of it. The boy's name would be George Stanley. No questions asked.  
  
He cleared his throat loudly as Harry and Hermione stopped secretively conversing. Just he was about to tell them what the child's name would be, Hermione called to the nurse with the pen, "His name is Simon, Simon James Potter."  
  
Mr. Granger was outraged! He muttered the boy's *real* name under his breath. "Now, Stan," his wife murmured to him. "Simon is their baby, and they'll name him what they want."  
  
Glaring, Mr. Granger took a seat in the hard chair in the corner. From thence he watched Hermione and that stupid wizard husband of hers fuss over minute Geo- er, Simon.  
  
Mrs. Granger put her hand on the arm of her husband's chair. "You know, Stan, I always wondered why you hated Harry so much. They're so happy together. How could you curse your daughter's happiness?"  
  
Mr. Granger cringed. "He stole her away from me. He took my daughter. She's not even nineteen, and she's a married mother! And he did that."  
  
"Her life makes her very happy, Stan," she answered. "There's nowhere in the world either of them would rather be than here. There's no one either of them would be happy with aside from each other. They love each other, Stan. Look at them, just sitting there in awe of the life they've created." Tears now shone in Mrs. Grangers eyes. "They make EACH OTHER happy."  
  
Mr. Granger swallowed the lump in his throat. He still hated Harry, but if Hermione was happy with him.Mr. Granger was still completely numb with the shock of what was happening. She had grown up, and he'd not been there to see it. Now, he just. wanted his little girl back. He ducked out of the room and shed his long suppressed tears. 


	3. The Visit part uno

Chapter 3  
  
Mr. Granger sat huffily in the ugly brown checked lounge chair that sat aside the living room window. He was pretending to read a newspaper while secretly seething at the conversation he heard his wife having with her sister Rachael over the phone.  
  
"Yes, that's right, Rach. You and David need to bring Julia over here for when they arrive." Mrs. Granger was talking to her younger sister (who strangely enough had given birth to her first, last, and only child at forty-two. This happened circa one month previous.) about Hermione coming over with baby Simon.  
  
About fifteen minutes later, Mr. Granger rolled his eyes and gritted his teeth as David, Rachael, and Julia Williams were let into his house. Forcing a smile, he shook David's hand before 'going back to his newspaper'. It would be a long day.  
  
No sooner had Mr. Granger huffed in revulsion a fiftieth time, when the doorbell rang. "Oh," said Rachael excitedly. "That must be them!"  
  
Mrs. Granger smiled as she opened the door. She flung her arms around Hermione as she entered, tears in her eyes.  
  
"It's okay, Mum," Hermione stuttered in shock at being bombarded. "It's only been two days since you last saw me." She grinned at Harry as he walked in carrying Simon's bassinette. Mr. Granger had a sudden rouge urge to knock it out of his hands.  
  
His face contorted to a nasty puce as everyone scrambled to hold, touch, and look at the new addition to the family. They all seemed to be laboring under the delusion that the Potter bastard's son was cute and worth their notice! How silly and blind they all were!  
  
"Oh, Hermione," a smiling Rachael cooed, playing with the zipper of Simon's feety pajamas "He's absolutely adorable."  
  
"Thank you," Hermione giggled back, her arm linked through Harry's. Harry kissed her lovingly on the side of her head. She thereafter place that head on Harry's broad, muscular shoulder. The whole sight was positively sickening to Mr. Granger! Gut-wrenching at the nicest!  
  
"Stan," Mrs. Granger's voice came from the rear of him. "I thought we discussed this when we were at the hospital."  
  
Mr. Granger turned to face his wife, a snarling scowl on his livid face. "He bugs me. He still bugs me. Him and his son can just-"  
  
"STAN!" Mrs. Granger reprimanded in a dangerous whisper. She dragged him into the kitchen so not to be overheard. "Do you have even the faintest of notions about how upset Hermione would be if she heard all this?" Seeing his confused face, she sarcastically added. "Yes, her name is Hermione, Stan. Anytime you need me to remind you of this fact, just ring the buggering cow bell!" She seemed to be very mad. "I've had it up to my ears with your prejudice! The sad truth is, he was there for her, and you weren't. If anyone should be being judged, Stanley Granger, it should be YOU!" She stormed out.  
  
Mr. Granger was in shock. So the truth really does hurt.  
  
"Uh, Dad," Hermione poked her face into the kitchen.  
  
"What?" he snapped, more harshly than he'd meant it.  
  
She shrugged looking nervous. So now he made her nervous? Just how evil had he been towards his family over the years? "It's just that some lady named Lydia Jenkins is on the phone for you. She sounds angry. Something about an overbite." 


	4. The Visit part dos

Chapter 4  
  
At dinner, Mrs. Granger purposely seated Mr. Granger and Harry next to each other out on the patio where they were going to eat. When they sat down, Harry gave a nervous smile that remained unrequited.  
  
For his wife sake, Mr. Granger didn't speak while the meal was being eaten. Harry seemed happy enough though, laughing and chatting spiritedly as he held Simon in the crook of his arm, feeding him his bottle.  
  
"He sure eats, doesn't he?" commented David with a smirk. He turned to his wife. "Julia didn't eat that much did she?"  
  
"Well," Rachael answered. "Julia is a girl. Men are always pigs." A Harry and David pretended to look hurt, she said. "Am I right?" to Hermione and Mrs. Granger, who laughed.  
  
Mr. Granger rolled his eyes and tried to look dignified, as though this idle conversation was beneath his high-horsed notice. Harry and David might have been pigs, but Stanley M. Granger DDS was dignified.  
  
Hermione, being across from Harry, reached over to grasp her husband's hand and smile at him. He smiled back. It was so obvious that they loved each other, but that still wasn't good enough for Mr. Granger.  
  
He glared and his wife shot him a warning look that snapped 'don't you dare'. He heaved a deep breath. Mr. Granger couldn't help it.  
  
Over dessert, the family discussed another touchy subject. Hermione's labor.  
  
"Oh, I had it really easy. I was only in labor with him about two hours." She had moved to sit on Harry's other side. He had his strong arm draped around her shoulders. "He was pretty easy."  
  
"Oh, I hate you!" Rachael joked, falsely hitting Hermione on the arm. "Julia was so much longer than that!"  
  
Mr. Granger felt as though he were about to implode. "I beg your pardon, but I must go. I have work to do." He got up from the table and crossed the patio.  
  
When he reached the screen door, he looked back at his wife, but instead glimpsed his daughter. He face had fallen; she looked so disappointed. It was all his fault. His fault. Something that *nothing* had been his entire life. HIS fault. 


	5. Rest

Chapter 5  
  
Mrs. Granger had insisted on the Potters spending the night. After thanking her for her kindness and hospitality, Harry, with one last kiss for Hermione, disappeared. Ah. if only he's never come back.  
  
Mr. Granger scoffed as Harry reappeared with clothes, toiletries, and the like. It would be a miracle if morning came and Stan hadn't strangled the jerk in his sleep.  
  
It was 1:07 AM by the digital clock next to the Grangers' bed, and still Mr. Granger had found no sleep. The thought of his little daughter in a bed with Harry Potter made him sick. Yes, he was SURE that it WASN'T his wife's chicken.  
  
Oh, it was no use! When had Hermione grown up so much? How couldn't he have noticed it? Still the prisoner of insomnia, Mr. Granger decided to head downstairs.  
  
When he got there, he spotted Harry sitting on the couch rocking Simon back and forth in his arms as he mumbled some lullaby haphazardly. The sight warmed Mr. Granger's heart of ice. At least Harry loved Stan's grandson.  
  
Harry stopping singing long enough to press his lips to Simon's tiny forehead, assuring his baby that everything would be alright. "Oh, hello Mr. Granger." He said, looking up from his son.  
  
Embarrassed, Mr. Granger moved out of the shadows and into the living room. He waved his hand about, unable to think of a matter-of-fact statement. "W- What's wrong with him?" Stan offered lamely.  
  
"He just woke up," Harry drew a breath before continuing. "I didn't want to wake Hermione, so I took him down here."  
  
"So," Stan asked, unable to control himself any longer. "You love my daughter, do you?"  
  
Harry nodded. "I love her with all my heart. There are no two people in the world I love more than Simon and Hermione."  
  
Mr. Granger was silent. He KNEW that what Harry said was true, but. but.  
  
"Harry! I wondered where you smuggled our son to." Hermione had entered the room.  
  
"He, uh, woke up, so I took him down here. He's asleep again now though."  
  
Hermione smiled at her husband, who was still rocking minute Simon back and forth. Even Mr. Granger could see it, love swirled are this threesome of Potters.  
  
Mr. Granger right then began to wonder if the run off from the melting going on in his quickly warming heart could kill him. "I'm just glad he loves her." Mr. Granger muttered as he climbed the stairs. He paused on the top step, and looked back to see Harry lying on the couch, Simon wrapped in one arm, and Hermione in the other. For once, he didn't flinch. He could rest now. 


End file.
